star trails etc. beginner not quite what he is doing :-(

[gaiusross]

Hello everyone, I'm new here and would like to get into astrophotography. I had a very modest budget so after researching how to take star trails I brought a kodak az251 bridge camera. I read the manual and also startrails.de for the settings. I set the aperture to F3.7 (it only has 2 settings, F3.7 & F11.07). Shutter was set to 30seconds. ISO set to 400 (it can go up to 3200). EV auto set to -2.0.

I set it to auto shoot every 30 seconds. All I got was black sky. I am in Wales on holiday and am in the national park of the brecon beacons. It is meant to be the fifth darkest place in the world. I have 2 nights left. Any help would be most appreciated.

[Skipper Billy]

If you have control over the exposure time and the aperture then adjusting the Auto EV shouldnt make any difference but I am not familiar with that camera.

Stick the ISO up to 3200 lens wide open f3.7 and try 30 seconds.

You should get an image.

If its too bright lower the ISO.  If its too dark lengthen the exposure.

[Skipper Billy]

ps - you need manual focus not auto focus - focus on the moon then recompose, lens at wide angle and have spare batts it will romp through AA's on long exposures ;-)

[happy-kat]

If no manual focus available see if there is a landscape setting instead but you need to keep the apperature at f3.7.

[IanWatkins]

No manual focus on this camera, you are going to struggle but should be possible.

I guess the issue is going to be forcing it to focus at infinity.

Ian

[happy-kat]

Most Kodak cameras have a menu option for macro or infinity (some times called landscape) so hopefully this model will have that option. Though it may well override keeping the apperature wide.

There is landscape mode on the dial ring. You might have to see if there is a focus menu option so you can select infinity when in m (manual) mode.

Also don't zoom in that keep it fully wide and then just the smallest of zooms, fully wide may show some barrel distortion.

[daveangie0110]

Hi all please help I have attempted to do a star trail I have taken 2 hours worth of 30 second shots, I am today going to try and put the photos together using starstax , but I don't know what to do first , shall I stack them first or use Lightroom to make the pictures look better before I use starstax. Thanks

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[tingting44]

Hi all please help I have attempted to do a star trail I have taken 2 hours worth of 30 second shots, I am today going to try and put the photos together using starstax , but I don't know what to do first , shall I stack them first or use Lightroom to make the pictures look better before I use starstax. Thanks

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glad you got your data ok with auto focus! 

use this program it does it all for you

http://www.markus-enzweiler.de/StarStaX/StarStaX.html

edit, just re read your post, dont stack 1st thats what starstax will do, do any PP after you got the final starstax image main thing is you got the data so you can allways work on it when at home again  

[daveangie0110]

That's what I am using . Thanks anyway

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[happy-kat]

How did you get on with your camera settings?